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The Mets part ways with Johan Santana, by not picking up his club option. So now Johan is a free agent, I wish him luck. I appreciated his time with the Mets, I hope that he lands with a good club and gets to pitch this year.

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I tried to show Junior some racism today and it was thwarted by the cops and Whitey.

Also, I can't wait for the winter meetings to start ... someone is going to give Ellsbury an absolutely ridiculous contract (please be Rube, please be Rube, please be Rube) and I am going to laugh my ass off.

Always figured Ausmus would become a manager one day. He handled the Astros pitching staff quite well for a long time. I am sorta surprised the Tigers just signed him with no previous experience. Usually former players have to do their time in the minors again before they're considered.

After two shoulder capsule tears, Santana's career is most likely over. 134 pitches in that no-hitter certainly didn't help. He'll get a NRI from somebody, but I can't imagine anything more than that.

That contract will be nice to have off the books. Between age and injury, the Mets have a knack for signing star pitchers on the wrong end of their prime - Glavine, Pedro, Santana.

And their young pitchers have a tendency to get hurt and flame out. I'm really hoping the Harvey, Wheeler, Mejia combo isn't this generation's Isringhausen/Pulsipher/Wilson mess.

As for Santana, maybe someone takes a flyer on him. I can't see him being a mop up middle reliever that comes in a blowout once a week, or someone who hangs out in the minors half the year and makes a spot start or two, or gets called up in July or August to be a sacrificial arm as some hot prospect approaches his innings limit. Best case is as the 5th starter somewhere?

Always figured Ausmus would become a manager one day. He handled the Astros pitching staff quite well for a long time. I am sorta surprised the Tigers just signed him with no previous experience. Usually former players have to do their time in the minors again before they're considered.

It's a very, very strange hire. I mean, Ausmus was widely pegged as a future manager when playing, but he repeatedly refused major league coaching or minor league managerial jobs and wouldn't even talk MLB manager jobs unless it was a perfect situation. His only bench experience at all was with Team Israel in the WBC qualifiers last year, and he's spent the last four years with a part-time special assistant role in San Diego that appeared to be the usual sinecure that job title represents.

The history of former players dropped directly into managerial jobs is terrible, because they usually don't have the basic decisions down pat and rely too much on gut instincts from their playing days. I mean, maybe Ausmus breaks the trend, but if you really watched Mike Matheny's game management decisions in the playoffs and said, "Boy, I gotta get me some of that," then you deserve exactly what you're getting from Brad Ausmus.

SmoothieX wrote:

As for Santana, maybe someone takes a flyer on him. I can't see him being a mop up middle reliever that comes in a blowout once a week, or someone who hangs out in the minors half the year and makes a spot start or two, or gets called up in July or August to be a sacrificial arm as some hot prospect approaches his innings limit. Best case is as the 5th starter somewhere?

I'm not even sure someone will take a one-year gamble on him at this point. I mean, Santana's arm is completely cooked (one shoulder capsule tear is hard enough to come back from -- two essentially means you're done) and even in 2012, when he was supposedly healthy (before his arm fell off), he was getting hit pretty hard. As I said, I'm sure someone will give him a NRI in February, but you're better off lighting money on fire than giving guaranteed cash to Santana at this point.

Always figured Ausmus would become a manager one day. He handled the Astros pitching staff quite well for a long time. I am sorta surprised the Tigers just signed him with no previous experience. Usually former players have to do their time in the minors again before they're considered.

It's a very, very strange hire. I mean, Ausmus was widely pegged as a future manager when playing, but he repeatedly refused major league coaching or minor league managerial jobs and wouldn't even talk MLB manager jobs unless it was a perfect situation. His only bench experience at all was with Team Israel in the WBC qualifiers last year, and he's spent the last four years with a part-time special assistant role in San Diego that appeared to be the usual sinecure that job title represents.

The history of former players dropped directly into managerial jobs is terrible, because they usually don't have the basic decisions down pat and rely too much on gut instincts from their playing days. I mean, maybe Ausmus breaks the trend, but if you really watched Mike Matheny's game management decisions in the playoffs and said, "Boy, I gotta get me some of that," then you deserve exactly what you're getting from Brad Ausmus.

SmoothieX wrote:

As for Santana, maybe someone takes a flyer on him. I can't see him being a mop up middle reliever that comes in a blowout once a week, or someone who hangs out in the minors half the year and makes a spot start or two, or gets called up in July or August to be a sacrificial arm as some hot prospect approaches his innings limit. Best case is as the 5th starter somewhere?

I'm not even sure someone will take a one-year gamble on him at this point. I mean, Santana's arm is completely cooked (one shoulder capsule tear is hard enough to come back from -- two essentially means you're done) and even in 2012, when he was supposedly healthy (before his arm fell off), he was getting hit pretty hard. As I said, I'm sure someone will give him a NRI in February, but you're better off lighting money on fire than giving guaranteed cash to Santana at this point.

It'll be interesting to see what happens. Perfect situation for Ausmus, I suppose, but there's usually a reason players will spend a few years in the minors. It's a transition with learning pains and Detroit's supposed to be contending. I wonder if Leyland can be lured somewhere else or if he really means he's retiring.

As for Santana... I dunno, I can see teams willing to give him a small contract not much over league minimum with some incentives based on appearances. It'd be a low risk investment if Santana's willing to go for it and not hold out for more. But he's really gonna have to show he can stay healthy for a season before it'd be a good idea to throw any money at him. Basically the poster child why it's nuts to give pitchers those huge long term contracts.

In other news, we're twenty days away from the release of this year's Hall of Fame ballot to the BBWAA ... and finally, Jack Morris is in his last year of eligibility. If the BBWAA pulls a Jim Rice and puts him in this year, I'm going to murder every single writer who voted to do so.

It would be hard for him to pull that off. He couldn't even outvote Biggio last year. Not only is he on his second ballot, but you have Maddux and Glavine appearing for the first time. If at least one of them doesn't get the votes first time I'll be surprised. Plus a lot of other strong candidites. I think Mr Morris is done. He was a good pitcher who had a long career with a few great seasons, but that's the extent of it.

tough one, a few strong new candidates, which is tough for the older candidates. BBWAA gets antsy when they let too many in, so a few of the newer guys may hurt the older guys' chances...

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Perhaps, if I am very lucky, the feeble efforts of my lifetime will someday be noticed and maybe, in some small way, they will be acknowledged as the greatest works of genius ever created by man. ~Jack Handey
STO: @JScout33

It would be hard for him to pull that off. He couldn't even outvote Biggio last year. Not only is he on his second ballot, but you have Maddux and Glavine appearing for the first time. If at least one of them doesn't get the votes first time I'll be surprised. Plus a lot of other strong candidites. I think Mr Morris is done. He was a good pitcher who had a long career with a few great seasons, but that's the extent of it.

Poor use of pronouns. Biggio's on his second ballot is what I was saying. First Astro in the Hall of Fame probably. Though I'll be disappointed in the extreme if Maddux isn't a first ballot HoFer. Last year was really Morris' best shot, too many big names on this years ballot to justify electing him short of sympathy voters.

The ballot is so crowded this year, though, that I wouldn't put it past some knuckleheaded writers to leave Maddux off their ballot this time, knowing that he'll make it in at some later date, in order to vote for someone who's in danger of falling off.